[Samba] MS Access and RAID

Tue Oct 29 11:05:01 GMT 2002

Harry,

I can't see it being the RAID either.  

Have you checked the network basics?  I had a problem just the other week
with very slow transfers and eventually discovered lots of carrier errors on
the NIC and traced it back to a dodgy switch port in our Cisco 2940.  Just
do an 'ifconfig' and make sure you have a decent network connection.  I
notice that you describe a slowness in your original posting so even if
ifconfig is not showing errors I would try a new cable and switch port and
also maybe try some simple large file tranfers and see if there is
noticeable difference between the two servers.  Could also be the NIC itself
of course.

If the networking checks out fully and the Samba configs and versions are
identical then I would try enabling the oplocks anyway and see if that
helps.  Hopefully :() you will discover it is a networking issue....

HTH 
Cheers,
Noel

-----Original Message-----
From: Harry Mills [mailto:harry at navaho.co.uk]
Sent: 29 October 2002 10:48
To: Noel Kelly
Subject: RE: [Samba] MS Access and RAID

Just a quick note to say thanks for your prompt response to my posting
yesterday. So far, you are the only respondant ;)

I am in a bit of a pickle, because the Access DB is live, and people are
kicking up a fuss ;(

I have read through the posting(s) you mentioned. Thing that is worrying me,
is
the fact that the old and new boxes are identical - Kernel, Samba version,
smb.conf, and Hardware (Cobalt Qube) - the only difference is the twin HD
doing
Raid. I suppose the best bet it to rebuild the new box as a single drive
machine, and start again! TBH, though, I just cannot see it being RAID, the
load average is virutally 0.0.

I have one question for you......

I know access is a broken database, when shared across a network. Is it
better
to simply say - put the DB back on a Win98 Workstation, and share it from
there?

The problem is, their 'Database experts' simply say - its not us, its
Navaho.  

Thanks again

Regards

Harry

On Mon, 28 Oct, Noel Kelly  wrote:
> I'll let someone with more knowledge than I get into the RAID buffer
> discussions but just wanted to make sure you had the same smb.conf on the
> two machines?  And therefore had oplocks turned off?
> 
> A recent posting which you might have already seen:
> 
> 	1.  Always run the Access database application, (Forms, code,
> queries, ...) on a client workstation and have the back-end data on the
> server.  The application container links to the shared tables on the
server.
> 
> 	2.  Oplocks = no 
> 	3.  Kernel Oplocks = no 
> 	4.  Level2 Oplocks = no 
> 	5.  Blocking Locks = yes 
> 	6.  Locking = yes 
> 	7.  Strict Locking = no 
> 	8.  Share Modes = yes
> 
> Success will be improved if you follow the pessimistic locking model for
> most of your data access.  This means that the edited record is always
> locked.  You should do this regardless of whether you use Windows or Samba
> on your back end server.  This also applies to point number 1.
> 
> HTH
> Noel
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Harry Mills [mailto:harry at navaho.co.uk]
> Sent: 28 October 2002 08:57
> To: samba at lists.samba.org
> Subject: [Samba] MS Access and RAID
> 
> 
> Hi,
> 
> We have been having a few problems with a M$ Access DB held on a Samba
> server
> 
> Samba version: samba-2.2.4-2N1
> 
> We have rebuilt a new server, and transferred the database over to the new
> box, along with word/excel docs etc. Everything is working fine, except
the
> access database, which is running very very slowly (can be over a minute
to
> open a record).
> Details are a little sketchy, but it would seem that when the new server
is
> being used, one workstation has reasonable access speeds, but subsequent
> workstations are slow - although this could be a 'user diagnosis syndrome'
> ;)
> 
> The access binary is held locally on the workstations.
> If you transfer the database back to the old samba server, it runs fine.
> The two servers are running the same version of samba, same Kernel
(2.4.18).
> The workstations are Windows98, doing domain logons to the Samba server.
> 
> The only difference I can see between the old and new servers, is the new
> server has two raided (mirror) IDE drives, the old server is a single
drive
> box. There are no errors on the NICS, oplocks are off for *.mdb and *.ldb
> and
> tcpdump shosw data flowing consistently between the server and the
> workstation. The Load Ave on the box is near enough 0.0.
> 
> For the moment, I have put them back on the old server.
> 
> Any help would be gratefully received - bit stumped on this one!
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-- 
Harry Mills                                        DDI:01749 812100
Educational Development Manager                    Fax:01749 812749
Navaho Technologies                                Main Office: 0870 7034015
http://www.navaho.co.uk/ 

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